Ska’d For Life - Horace Panter
I recently bought this book from the bargain bucket bin at HMV. its a biography of the specials by their fantastic bass player - Horace Panter. I wasn’t expecting much due to the fact that it cost 3 pounds and the only quotes on the back were from the Daily Sport and Mojo. Not only this but the foreword was by none other than Phil Jupitus. surely they could have got Jerry Dammers or Rick Rogers or someone who actually had something to do with The Specials rather than just some tv comedian.
This book was amazing from the start to the finish, it was interesting and informative and thankfully layed off the rock and roll reel-off stories about doing coke of Toya Wilcox’s left tit that most of these sort of books tend to have. The book taught me about how the band actually developed. I was quite shocked by the fact that they had been going for nearly 3 years before they got a single out. iIthink this was more a sign of the times because these days very few bands even manage to last 3 years, let alone last without a release.
My one critisiscm with the book is Horaces’ self-depreciation throughout the book. I tend to hate people who constantly portray themselves as the uncool one or the one that no-one likes. Generally because these people actually think quite highly of themselves and use this as a way of making themselves seem humble, rather than vain. He constantly refers to himself as the worst-dressed or the conservative one that people dont wanna party with. But seeing their press shots he looks great, so I dont get his point.
The book also told me some great factoids about the band such as Terry Halls first band before The Specials. Coventry punk band SQUAD. From reading this I hunted them out, unfortunatly there is no recording with Terry Hall on them, but every review or piece of information I have found about them says Hall was fantastic in them, this is a shame no such recordings exist. Also that Suggs from Madness used to be a Sham 69 skinhead, this I wasn’t surprised about but, put me off Suggs a bit due to the reputation of the Sham Skins.
I reccomend this book to everone, its sharp and at no point was I bored and Panter has found a good medium between giving you the facts and not making it a bore-fest.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHTK2MVY4CQ The Specials - Do the Dog (Live Japan 80)
